But the headline writer completely missed the point. In full context, the Speaker of the House wasn’t welcoming anything of the kind Thursday. Ryan was publicly ridiculing President Barack Hussein Obama for lodging toothless, last-minute sanctions against Russia over some alleged hacking into and publicizing of a bunch of detrimental Democratic party e-mails during last month’s presidential election. (The irony here is that we forget our belief in the First Amendment when it’s convenient.)

Some critics of President-elect Donald J. Trump believe the hacking blitz that originated from somewhere in or near the Kremlin helped to derail the campaign of Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Lest you missed it, here’s the crux of Rep. Ryan’s statement: “While today’s action by the administration is overdue, it is an appropriate way to end eight years of failed policy with Russia. And it serves as a prime example of this administration’s ineffective foreign policy that has left America weaker in the eyes of the world.”

In other words, Ryan was saying, (1) Obama’s foreign policy throughout his two terms as president has been abysmal, (2) the sanctions he imposed were too little too late, and (3) his paltry 11th-hour move is what anyone would expect from a failure of a president bent on filling his post-White House library with official-looking but largely meaningless documents.

Can President Obama even spell “lame duck,” let alone realize that he is one?

* * *

If you read (and believe) the garbage littering the blogosphere at the hands of CNN’s John Blake and Tawanda Scott Sambou, it’s no wonder there’s a popular perception that race relations are going down the toilet in these United States.

* * *

Billionaire globalist George Soros, the scourge of conservatives around the planet, just penned a rant in which he describes President-elect Trump as a con artist and a would-be dictator bent on demolishing the new world order.

Demolishing the “new world order”? New world disorder is more like it. We can only hope the “new world order” is demolished in favor of an epidemic of socio-economic freedom.

When you get right down to it, crybaby Soros sounds a lot like the pot calling the kettle black.

* * *

Soon-to-be average citizen Barack Obama tells former White House senior adviser and podcaster David Axelrod that his – Obama’s – best friends from high school treat him the same now as they did then. Moreover, Obama notes that they don’t call him “Mr. President.”

Which makes one wonder what they do call him. And that makes one further wonder if Obama has any idea what his adversaries call him. (At this juncture, you allow your imagination to run wild.)

* * *

And now, further proof that youngsters ought to devote more time to regular socializing, face-to-face dialogue, and developing traditional communication skills.

NBC News aired details on “Social Media Use and Children’s Well-being,” a recent report published by the Institute of Labor Economics in Bonn, Germany. The report notes that after four years of study involving British families, young teenagers who spend as little as one hour a day chatting on social networks are miserable and are 14 percent more prone than normal to engage in cyberbullying, making more social comparisons than usual, and engaging in other anti-social behavior.

The average teen, according to the study, devotes not one hour, but nine hours a day to manipulating electronic devices.

What’s the solution? Experts point to more and better personal education by parents and teachers who should remind young teens repeatedly about why social media can be as harmful as they are helpful. Of course, that’s like trying to explain to a youngster why smoking eventually will kill him or her.

* * *

News celebrities and political commentators need to weigh their off-the-cuff words more painstakingly, if only to avoid irresponsible outbursts.

Take, for example, sometimes overly cynical attorney Kimberly Guilfoyle of “The Five” on FOX News channel. A clip aired Thursday on “The Five” described how President-elect Trump is fashioning his upcoming inaugural speech in the spirit of President John F. Kennedy and President Ronald Reagan.

The short video clip of JFK, a lifelong Democrat in a long family line of Democrats, showed Kennedy during his “Ask not …” speech that captivated the nation. When the TV camera swiveled back to “The Five” panelists, Guifoyle blurted out: “Kennedy sounded like a Republican.”

No he didn’t, Ms. Guifoyle. Kennedy sounded like a bipartisan president and a natural-born leader, standing tall for the red, white and blue spirit of the greatest nation on the planet.

Please, opinion-makers, make a concerted effort to avoid poisoning good statesmanship with the rancor of petty politics. It makes you look cheap and stupid.

* * *

Want to experience up close and personal what it means when a police officer is slain in the line of duty?

Double-click on the following Web link to a CBS report about 9-year-old Caroline Smith’s remembrance of her father, police Sgt. Michael Smith, who was among the five officers fatally ambushed last week in Dallas.